Qatar Celebrates 10th Year of GLOBE Implementation

Oct 27, 2010

Since its foundation in September of 2000 by the Minister of Education's Office, the GLOBE Program in Qatar has engaged in many activities to benefit the region: hosted the 7th Annual Regional Meeting in 2008, offered an International Training Workshop, participated in establishing the North Africa and Near East Consortium, collaborated with the Peace Corps, and continues to thrive, with 194 teachers trained in GLOBE in Qatar. GLOBE Qatar provides student investigation opportunities aimed at engagement in strong partnerships with organizations such as the Qatari royal family's Gulf Recycling program, the Supreme Education Council (SEC), the Qatar Math and Science Teachers' Association (QMASTA) and the College of the North Atlantic. The Supreme Education Council provided the training of 132 teachers over the past two years through the support of Ibrahim Al Mannai, Director, Curriculum Standards Office, trained by master trainers Najwa Ali Ahmed Ali, Abdelqader Mohammad and Paulla VanOeveren.

Together they held five sessions this year covering Atmosphere, Hydrology, Soil and Phenology and are now doing one more training for the new GLOBE Leadership Team and will include Land Cover. Ms. Fatima Al Rashid is the new Government Point of Contact and the Supreme Education Council's Science Team Leader for the Curriclulum Standards Office. Fatima says, "One of the Four Pillars of Qatar's vision 2030 is to manage the environment so as to ensure harmony and consistency between economic and social development and environmental protection, and by reference to the pillar I, a human development, we find that the State of Qatar aimed its vision to build an educational system that keeps pace with international standards and modern equivalent of the best educational systems in the world. Ms. Fatima goes on to say "The GLOBE Program is one of the educational programs that links students, teachers, and societal research to learn more about our local environment and globally, through communication over the internet to study environmental issues. It follows the Qatar National Professional Standards and Curriculum Standards, which aims to develop students' critical thinking skills and the enjoyment of learning new things."

Ms. Fatima is assisted by Ms. Hamda Naseer, GLOBE Country Coordinator, who has been an outstanding GLOBE teacher in Qatar, and has worked her way up to Academic Vice Principal of Zubaida Primary Independent School for Girls. Her GLOBE students were rewarded by meeting His Highness Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani, the Emir of the State of Qatar and Her Highness Sheikha Mozah Bint Nasser, the Emir's wife. She has assisted in GLOBE training for the past two years. Ms. Hamda says, "GLOBE makes students excited about science. Students enjoy doing projects and experiments dealing with GLOBE protocols. I love to share my experiences with people about teaching GLOBE. It can enrich much scientific information for the students and fits in with Qatar's Science Curriculum Standards."

Also on the new team of trainers is Maryam Hussain, ISO Specialist for SEC. When she was a little girl, she wanted to do hands-on science projects and was very happy when the British Council director gave her this type of project. Since GLOBE provides these science projects, students will enjoy science so much more. Finally, the rest of the team are SEC Curriculum Standards Master Trainers: Anita Abraham, Najwa Ali, and Amina Amir Hamza; SEC Science Consultants: Shelly Micham and Paulla VanOeveren; SEC Action Research Consultant: Dr. Margery Anderson, Imran Asif, SEC Science Specialist, Naser Elhafy, Gulf Recycling General Manager. This year marks the official Supreme Education Council merger with the Ministry of Education. Therefore, Qatar has MOE and SEC members of the team working together with Community organizations, like Gulf Recycling, and hope to include more as GLOBE progresses in Qatar.

Paulla VanOeveren has been training teachers in GLOBE for 2 years in Qatar. She says, "GLOBE is the best program to teach differentiation, integration of subjects across the curriculum and meet the needs of special needs students, all while building a solid science program. She and her husband Dave VanOveren wrote the following poem for an Awards Ceremony held in June 2009 to honor 66 trained teachers receiving GLOBE certificates in order to express how much they personally value GLOBE. Paulla also recently presented this poem at the Near East and North African Regional Conference in Lebanon.

WHAT IS GLOBE?

GLOBE IS COOL TO DO IN SCHOOL

PRACTICAL SCIENCE THAT'S THE RULE

HANDS-ON, MINDS-ON FOR EVERYONE

INTEGRATING SUBJECTS ALL MADE FUN

YOU MAY BE ASKING WHO DOES GLOBE?

K THROUGH 12 WEARING ABIYAS OR THOBE

MILLIONS OF MEASUREMENTS DONE BY KIDS

SCIENTISTS USE DATA FROM WHAT YOU DID

50,000 TEACHERS USE IT WORLD WIDE

111 COUNTRIES WORKING SIDE BY SIDE

STUDENTS, TEACHERS AND COMMUNITIES

ALL HAVING A CUP OF TEA

WHAT DO THEY STUDY, YOU MIGHT ASK?

SCIENTIFIC INQUIRY - RESEARCH THAT LASTS

FIRST YOU TEST THE SOIL, WATER OR AIR

ENTER DATA ON THE NET FOR ALL TO COMPARE

ALOOM WANASA, YOU WILL SEE

ACTION RESEARCH IS THE KEY

SCIENTIFIC QUESTIONS, WHERE DO YOU GO?

THE AWESOME WORLD WIDE WEB OF GLOBE

DON'T FALL INTO LOW TEST SCORE ABYSS

REAL SCIENCE BY KIDS IS NEVER A MISS

BEAUTIFY SCHOOLS, PLANT A FLOWER OR TREE, IT'S AS EASY… AS 1, 2, 3.

VanOeveren has worked with GLOBE for nine years. She began her career as a GLOBE Teacher at Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Elementary School in Muskegon Heights, Michigan in 2001. As the Science Coordinator for King Elementary, VanOeveren assisted in the formation of the King Elementary School and Hudsonville High School collaboration, which partnered a 5th grade class with students from a local GLOBE high school to collect water and air quality data.

The GLOBE Program Office thanks Ms. Fatima Al Rashid and the entire GLOBE Qatar team. They are a tremendous asset to GLOBE as they continue to stimulate the hands and minds of students by making everyday science both a challenging and rewarding experience.